Worst Chicago song

Agreed. And IMHO starting with "16," they hardly sounded like the same band any more for the next decade and a half.

 

Dude, that's Heart, right??

Ed

 

HA! I knew I'd find the old men out in force here. You know - the "everything they did in the '80's and '90's sucks" crowd.

Okay, now back to Earth. Chicago has done some severely crappy tunes. To my ears, nothing is as bad as "Colour (dig the British spelling...how deep!) My World". To judge why this arpeggiated mess is so bad, let's take a look at the vomit-provoking first-daft (not a misspelling) "lyric" that Pankow offers up. One hopes these lyrics took him less time to write than it did to perform:

As time goes on, I realize
Just what you mean...to me
And now, now that you're near,
Promise your love, that I've waited to share
And dream of our moments together
Colour my world with hope of loving you

I'm assuming that, rather than being raised in Chicago, Pankow was actually raised in Ireland, spoke the native Gaelic, and learned English as a second language. This syntax-shattering pablum should have been tossed out and the tune given to Lamm so he could write a real lyric. How this became a standard is entirely beyond me.

Ed

P.S.: Note I said nothing about Walt Parazaider's "first day in flute class" solo.

 

I expected dreck when I clicked but...its so much worse than I imagined. its actually beyond bad, david foster needs to be put up for hate crime, this should not go unpunished

 

Oh geez. I disagree totally. It blows for most of you because it's not the original. It's not supposed to be. Let it go. I actually found it really brave of them to even try this. Apparently, they even tried a modernized take on "Does Anybody...". Apparently, it didn't work and they used this instead. Important to note that it's not actually just "25 or 6 to 4". It's a combination of that tune and remnants of something else James Pankow wrote - hence his co-writing credit on this redo.

Taken on it's own merits, I think it's actually really good. The horns are back in a huge way, Jason actually sounds good (he rarely does), and the background arrangement (likely Bill's) is really nice too. I like how Foster makes the obviously-formidable horns fight with his synths for space. It creates a really nice tension that builds until it breaks right before the vamp at the end. The production is absolutely dead-on and Foster nailed this.

Is it the original? No, nor should it be judged against it, though I totally understand why all of you are doing exactly that. Taken on it's own, though, I think it's excellent and one of the few "up" things Chicago was doing during this period that really works.

Ed

 

His diction on Till The End Of Time supports this assertion, and also spoils the song.

 

For the record, I gave Chicago III a spin last night and the flush sound comes at the conclusion of the fourth piece of the "Elegy"suite ("Progress"), not the end of the suite.

Carry on.

 

I actually liked the remake of "25 or 6 to 4"! I thought it was a cool way to reinvent the song at that time. We still have the original that I've heard at least 4,382 times to date.

The worst Chicago song for me has always been the single edit of "Hard to Say I'm Sorry", which cuts right before they break into "Get Away", which just seemed like an awesome return to form with a (then) modern touch! Those two songs belong together and it always irritated me to hear the single edit omit the most fun part of the song. It builds up to nothing!

 

At least if they were gonna end the tune, they should have crafted a proper ending specifically for the "single version" so it wasn't so clunky.

Ed

 

As far as albums go, no group has ever recorded an entire album in full-on identity crisis until Chicago did it with "19". There's nothing on that album that sounds remotely like Chicago. Even the '80's Chicago is nowhere to be found on it. I won't say all the songs are bad. I don't think they are. It's just that most are totally nondescript and not the least bit identifiable with Chicago. It does house a "worst song" candidate, though, in "We Can Last Forever". Again, Ron Nevison decides that Chicago is Heart and produces it thusly. The chord changes are boring, the lyric goes nowhere, and Jason's vocal is nothing to write home about. The "we can last for-EVVERRRRRRRRRRRRR OH" scream from Jason during the guitar solo is truly wretched. He likely doesn't want to illicit laugher but from me, that's what he gets there.

Ed

 

Genesis called. Literally.

 

They sound like Heart on the whole thing. You can almost hear Ann Wilson doing any of the Diane Warren tunes or the Diane Warren soundalikes on this thing. It ain't Genesis but it is Heart.

Ed

 

The Lamm-sung "I Stand Up" is OK. 21 has three good songs-- two by Lamm and one by Pankow-- but the remaining nine are probably worse than 19.

 

Robert only co-wrote one tune on that record and Pankow wrote nothing on it. I think you're thinking of the far-superior "Twenty-1".

Ed

 

Yes, the second part of the post above does refer to 21 (which I think is overall Chicago's worst album, despite the three good Pankow/Lamm tunes-- the rest is just the pits).

 

I don't hate "I Stand Up" but it's merely okay. Lamm can and has done far better than that.

"Twenty-1" isn't a disaster for me. By then, it appeared that Nevison had largely figured out how to produce the band. Chas Sandford nor he had a clue how to do it on "19". On "Twenty-1", he let the horns play again and the band brought better songs to the table. It also features one of Diane Warren's best ballads, "Explain It to My Heart". Humberto Gatica did that one and it's really good. I think there are some nice tunes there...even if it does include "You Come to My Senses" - the tune that apparently Chicago itself hates more than any other.

Ed

 

I've never heard a bad Chicago song. I have 2 compilation CDs of them and that's all I know. I like every track on both.

 

"Harry Truman"

 

This is far from the worst from this group, and the lyrics are simple, effective reflections of thought.
No biggee.
And the flute solo is perfect for the song, and like the lyrics, simple and effective.
It's an appropriate flute solo, and not at a beginning student level.

 

I agree that it's simple. I also get that many people like it. It just isn't my thing and, really, it totally pointed the way to the later fluff that the group would succumb to years later.

Ed

 

Mah Jongg

 

It Better End Soon - 4th Movement (Preach)

 

I'll just take a moment to note the irony of a song called "It Better End Soon" having a "4th Movement".

 

The dumbest one was Harry Truman. Interesting song but so far from Chicago its silly. Can you guess how it went over when a genius from SONY released the single in Japan? Apparently they have no warm and fuzzies for "Give Em' Hell Harry" over there. For the life of me I cannot imagine why.

 

For me . . . "Hard To Say I'm Sorry," for sure.